


Uncle Charles

by Dancer84



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies), X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: AU, Adoption, Family Drama, Fluff, Gen, Hank as a Dad, Nanny needed, Nightcrawler as a baby, the diapers need a hole for the tail
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-01-23 08:57:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18546505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dancer84/pseuds/Dancer84
Summary: A baby is left on the doorstep of the Xavier mansion...a blue baby. Charles has his suspicions about where the baby came from, but in the end it doesn't matter. Here is a child in need of a home. With the school closed, Charles and Hank try to raise a child--a child who can teleport! Set between XMFC and XMDOFP. How would things be different if Mystique left her son Kurt/Nightcrawler with her brother instead of with the circus? AU.





	1. Something Blue

Chapter 1: Something Blue

There was a thin mist clinging to the landscape, muting the features of the manicured lawn, the trimmed hedges, and the immense stone building that was the Xavier mansion. The mist would burn off in another hour or two, after the sun had risen properly. Most people didn’t like traveling in this early-morning mist, but it didn’t bother Raven. She knew the road, knew the landscape like the back of her hand. She and Charles had run all over these grounds as children.

She might have left, but she would never forget. She would never forget scavenging for food, lost and alone and trying desperately to act like an adult. She would take the form of one, but she hadn’t known how to be one yet. Luckily, most people didn’t bother to look past the face she showed them. Until she met Charles.

Things had ended badly between them, but they had started with such warmth. She would never forget the way he smiled at her when he saw her blue skin, the way he offered her everything that belonged to him, and carved out a space for her in his world. She had had a safe childhood because of him. They hadn’t had attentive parents, practically raising themselves, but she had never gone hungry again.

Until she left Charles.

The bundle in her arms let out a thin wail, and Raven made a soft shushing sound. He was hungry, but she didn’t have enough milk to keep him well fed. An unfortunate side-effect of not getting regular meals. It was a wonder she hadn’t lost the baby to begin with, but cradling him close and listening to his hungry cries, she knew she could not care for him.

She could not hide him. His skin was blue, just like hers, but he had a tail, just like his father, and there was no way to tell yet if his unique appearance would come with any special talents. Raven suspected it would. Perhaps one day he would be able to join her fight, but for now he needed a safe place to be. The one thing she could not provide. To do so, she would have to abandon her crusade, and she couldn’t do that.

Which was just one of many reasons that she was here, approaching Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters in the wee hours of the morning.

Raven paused on the front step, staring up at the wide, double doors. Once, she wouldn’t have hesitated to enter. Once, she would not have even considered knocking. But that had been a long time ago, and this was not her home any longer.

Besides, she didn’t intend to stay.

Careful not to jostle him, Raven set the infant down on the front step and tucked his blanket more firmly around him. It was the last act she could perform as a mother, and she lingered over it for a brief moment. Then she stepped back, squared her shoulders, rang the doorbell, and ran down the drive as fast as she could. Once Charles woke, he would be able to sense her presence, and she didn’t want him to know that she had been here.

He didn’t need to know who had borne the child. He didn’t need a family connection to take the infant in, make sure that the baby would be safe, fed, and even possibly loved. Charles would do that for anyone.

No need to open old wounds. No need to get into another argument that would just end in her leaving again. It was better this way.

But Raven paused when she reached the end of the lane, and hid herself behind the hedge to watch as the front door of the mansion opened. Hank stepped out, looked up and around and then down. He wasn’t blue anymore, and Raven briefly wondered how, but quickly shoved the thought away. She didn’t need to know. She watched as Hank lifted the baby into his arms, careful to support the head, and then searched the blanket for a note or any other clue.

He wouldn’t find one.

“Charles!” Hank turned into the house, and Raven quickly slid out of her hiding place and continued running down the lane.

Keep him safe, Charles.

 

o0o

 

“What is it?” Charles peered at the squirming bundle in Hank’s arms, but the sensation of hunger and discomfort that poured off of the small blue one gave him his answer even before Hank did.

“I think it’s a mutant infant. Do you remember that teleporter who worked for Shaw and then left with Erik? Of course he was red--”

And they had both seen this color of blue before.

Charles turned away from the infant to stare out the door, searching the lane with his mind more than his eyes. Here in Westchester, there weren’t so many minds to touch. The expansive grounds kept most people out of his range. Charles could barely feel the traffic along the main road. For a moment, he thought he felt something—someone--he recognized, but then it was gone. Moved out of his range.

The baby screamed again, its cries getting louder. Hank shifted nervously, awkwardly trying to bounce the baby in his arms. “What should we do with him?”

Charles turned back to the problem at hand. There was no point is searching further for Raven—she had left home and clearly wasn’t interested in coming back. If this was truly her child—they had not way to know—but in the end it didn’t matter.

“Feed him, I think.” Charles frowned at the infant. And hire a nanny.

“Feed him what? I mean, we might have some milk, but babies aren’t really supposed to eat cow’s milk. He needs his mother’s milk, or formula. Do you think the local grocery store carries formula? Or is it something you have to get directly from the doctor’s office? I have no idea.” Hank was babbling now, his mind giving of waves of nervousness.

Nervous because he already knew what they were going to do, before Charles ever agreed to it out loud.

The school had been closed last week, the last students packed up and sent home after the last teachers were drafted to the war. They had been trying to decide between them what to do next. Hank had promised that his work on modifying the serum he used to control his blue-ness was coming along well—that it might be able to give Charles his legs back soon.

That work would slow down if they were both spending their days tending to an infant.

Yes. They definitely needed a nanny.

“He needs a name,” Hank continued. “What should we call him? What should he call us?”

“We’ll get it all sorted out in time.” Charles reached up to take the child from Hank and nodded toward the door. “Would you bring the car around so we can go fetch some formula?”

Hank nodded and darted off, leaving Charles alone with the baby. He stared at the blue face, so familiar and yet so foreign. “Where are you, Raven? Are you alright?” Charles sighed and focused on the baby’s thoughts again. They were so simple and straightforward, no words, only vague sensations. There was an itch or a pinch along one back leg, and Charles, dipped his hand into the bundle of blankets and found a small note card there.

_His name is Kurt._

Was that handwriting familiar?

He would drive himself mad if he tried to play guessing games.

“Alright, Kurt, calm down. Everything is going to be just fine. Welcome home.”


	2. Nanny Needed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charles tries to find a nanny who doesn't mind the color blue. Hank bonds with baby Kurt and decides being blue isn't so bad.

_I can figure this ou_ _t_. Hank had lost count of the number of times had had told himself that. From fitting his big feet into tiny shoes to acing his SATs and getting into college early, to modifying the serum that would cure his mutation-- Well, that one hadn’t worked out as expected, not at first. But these days, Hank had figured out how to keep the blue fur at bay, and make his feet fit into shoes. If he could figure that out, he could handle this.

Right?

Hank turned from the kitchen counter, where he was mixing the ingredients of the formula together with all the precision he used while working on an experiment in the lab, and smiled at the infant lying in a blanket on the kitchen table. Baby Kurt was making a very, very distressing sound, but Hank was well aware that this was common for infants. It would stop as soon as he could get food into the infant’s mouth.

Right?

He had barely spent three hours with this baby, but he already desperately wanted the little fellow to be happy. To be healthy. To stop crying!!

“Alright. It’s nice and warm. Here you go.” Hank cradled the baby in one arm and tipped the bottle carefully into the tiny blue mouth. The lips latched onto the bottle and the baby sucked in the milk hungrily. Hank sighed in relief and settled into a chair to sit back while the baby had its meal.

Was he really getting ready to spend the next twenty years raising a kid? Sure, he had agreed to be a teacher and work with kids. But they had all been grown, at least ten, most of them teenagers. Why would anyone leave a baby in the care of two bachelors! Teaching, Hank could handle. Diapers and feeding?

 _I’ll figure this out_.

He had to. The little fellow’s life depended on it. This baby had no one else in the world to look after him. Still, Hank wished he’d had some time to prepare. Do a bit of research.

Charles was combing through the phone book looking for nanny agencies right this very minute. Hopefully, they would find someone to help them soon.

Someone who didn’t mind the fact that the baby was blue and had a tail. Said tail had worked its way out of the blanket and wrapped itself securely around Hank’s wrist. Hank smiled, feeling a surge of warmth almost as if the baby had wrapped his tiny hand around Hank’s finger. _That’s how a baby says ‘I love you,’_ he had once heard an aunt say. Did baby Kurt feel safe here?

Hank hoped so. He only wished Raven still felt safe here--no. That wasn’t the problem, in the end, was it? Raven didn’t want to be safe anymore, didn’t want to be protected, didn’t want to have to hide. But she had had the sense to know that this baby needed all of those things.

Hank closed his eyes, trying not to think of what he had missed out on. Trying not to think of Raven being with someone else. It wasn’t his right to be jealous, after all. He had rejected her, rejected her blue skin just like he had rejected his own big feet. Yet she had brought her baby here, where she knew he would be.

Had she meant it to be gift? Had she thought of him when she did it? Or was it merely an act of necessity, the only safe place she knew of?

“Don’t worry, Kurt. We’ll take care of you.” Hank watched as the bottle emptied and the baby’s eyes slowly drifted closed. He felt so small and fragile in Hank’s arms. How old was he? How fast would he grow? Mutant children usually grew at the same rate as human children. What would the kid need, in the coming years? The answer would be in a book, Hank was sure. Only, it was in the sort of book Hank had never ready before. That was ok. Hank had figured lots of things out for himself with the help of books. He could do it again.

Hank smiled down at the infant in his arms, despite the tremor of fear that still rattled around his insides. A fear deeper and stranger than anything he had felt before, not even after he injected himself with the serum and saw his new blue form, not even on the beach in Cuba. He was terrified of messing this up. Of not being a good enough parent to his child.

Yet at the same time, he wanted to take on the job, more than anything he had ever wanted before.

“I think I need to make a trip to the bookstore.”

o0o

“Hank!!!” Charles voice rang out across the corridors of the Xavier mansion. The sound was all too common these days. Charles shouting for Hank. Hank shouting for Charles. Kurt crying about something.

Hank set down his pad of paper and pencil, where he was outlining the design for a car seat that would have a transparent cover. One that would let the baby see out, but would not let anyone see in. They would need it for things like shopping trips, and if the kid ever wanted to go anywhere besides the Xavier estate grounds.

Hank had been considering whether it would be safe to make the car seat levitate with two miniature jet engines. Maybe even add a remote control? He would need several test runs before he actually put the baby in it, of course…

“Hank!” Charles called again, and the yell was followed by an angry wail from Kurt.

“Right.” Hank scurried down the hall to find Charles in the nursery, leaning over the changing table, clean diapers scattered across the surface. Charles was picking up on all of the small chores needed to care for a baby much more slowly than Hank had. Possibly something to do with the fact that he’d had servants to take care of that sort of thing for most of his life.

“There you are!” Charles beamed in relief as Hank entered the room and pushed his wheelchair back to allow Hank space at the changing table. “I need your engineering expertise. How do you get these things to stay put? And around the tail? And without hurting yourself.” Charles sucked on his thumb where he had stuck himself with a diaper pin.

Hank swallowed a grin and scanned the diaper table. “I modified a few diapers, cut a hole…” He picked up one diaper and frowned at the lop-sided hole in the bottom that was far too large to both accommodate the tail and seal in leaks. “Um--”

“Yes, well. We ran out. The laundry service doesn’t pick-up until tomorrow.” Charles

looked extremely vexed by this fact. Everything in his tidy, ordered life had been turned upside-down in the past week. “They can start coming more often, but not until next Tuesday. I told them it was an emergency, but--”

Telepathy didn’t work very well over the phone, and neither did telepathic ‘suggestions’.

“Right. We’ll make some more.” Hank flipped baby Kurt onto his belly and held up a diaper across his bare butt to measure the correct spacing for the hole, then picked up the scissors and snipped carefully. “Did you record this changing in the log?”

Charles grimaced. “Is that really necessary? He pees and poops, it’s what babies do.”

“Yes, but if we keep track of his habits, we’ll notice when something changes, and that could alert us to an illness or complication before he ever starts to show symptoms...you know, since he can’t tell us how he feels.”

The method had been recommended by several medical experts.

“I know how he feels.” Charles tapped his temple meaningfully. “I’ll alert us if his mood changes, or if he’s not feeling well.” Charles awkwardly folded the fresh diaper around Kurt’s bottom while Hank subtly checked the laundry bin to record the contents of the last diaper. “I can’t imagine how a young mother must feel, trying to figure all of this by guesswork. I knew he was getting uncomfortable and brought him here for a change before he even had a chance to cry about it. Ah!” Charles hissed as he pricked his finger on the diaper pin again. “It will be nice to have some help, though.”

“If we can find any help,” Hank said. “I mean, what are the odds we’ll get a nanny who doesn’t care if that baby is...you know.”

“We’ll find someone.” Charles finished with the diaper and leaned back in his chair, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I want to sleep again, and I know you do too, my friend.”

o0o

Charles looked at the woman in front of him. She certainly wore the proper attire: a professional suit jacket and fashionable skirt to make her look put-together and prepared for the job. But the jacket was canary yellow and the skirt and soft shade of blue, giving her a warm and inviting look, something that a child might respond well to. Her posture was impeccable; ankles cross, hands resting in her lap, and a polite but expectant smile on her face. Her resume was polished, her references appeared impressive.

Every candidate had been like that. After all, this was a job at the Xavier family estate. It would come with excellent pay, and if the lucky woman who landed the job could earn the respect and trust of the family, she would have job security for quite a while. Thus, the advertisement Charles had placed in the paper had drawn the best of the best.

Charles would not tolerate anything less. It had only been a few weeks since the squirming blue bundle of joy landed on his doorstep, but already he had grown attached to the infant. Despite the fact that neither he nor Hank had gotten a full night’s sleep since.

Hence the search for a suitable nanny.

Charles had screened over two dozen this week alone. They all had excellent credentials. Not a single one of them had been prepared for the interview, however.

“We will need to run a full criminal background check. Is there anything that we should know about?” That question was standard, and essential. Charles had been cared for by nanny’s himself as a child, and he knew what sorts of trouble one could run into when attempting to hire a stranger to take care of a child.

He knew how things could go wrong.

Charles frowned and suppressed a small twinge of guilt. Part of him didn’t want to hire a nanny at all. He had been raised by nannies and other household staff more than anyone else. His mother looked in from time to time, but she hadn’t ever spent much time with her son. Hadn’t done much to make him feel loved.

It was a lonely way to grow up. It was a childhood Charles didn’t want for little Kurt. It wouldn’t be hard to give the child attention. With the school closed, Charles had little else to do. But that didn’t change the fact that he could still barely manage to change a diaper, and there were things that women seemed to know about babies that Charles just couldn't seem to figure out. Hank had purchased a box full of books, and was wading through them, but neither of them had gotten a full night’s sleep in weeks.

They needed help.

“Yes, Mr. Xavier, I understand. You won’t find anything to concern you. Just a traffic ticket from a few years back.” She wasn’t lying. Good.

“Right everything seems to be in order. Just one more question.” Charles set down the resume and looked the young woman in the eye, his telepathic senses alert for her response. “How do you feel about the color blue?”

“It’s a lovely color! Do you have a boy then?” the woman smiled in eager anticipation of meeting the child, feeling sure she had landed the position.

Ha. Not quite. “Yes, as a matter of fact, we do.” Charles pulled his wheelchair out from behind his desk and wheeled over to the small bassinet set up in the corner. Kurt was sleeping there, swaddled tightly in a blanket decorated with teddy bears. Charles carefully lifted the baby into his arms, minding the head. “Here we go.”

“Oh--my.” The nanny paused, wide eyes staring at the little blue face that topped the bundle of blankets. “He--it’s--blue.”

“Yes.” In Charles’ arms, Kurt squirmed, as if he could sense the nanny’s sudden discomfort. Charles bounced him softly, to no avail. Kurt opened his mouth and let out a thin wail. “He’s a very special boy. Do you think you could calm him down?” Charles held out the bundle to the nanny, sensing that she had not quite decided what to think yet.

“That’s not a baby! That’s--” The woman’s voice was getting shrill, and Kurt let out a full-strength wail. The woman had finally realized that this was indeed the baby she was meant to look after. No, it wasn’t a joke. The familiar build-up of panic and revulsion rose up in her mind.

Charles frowned grimly. _Hank, would you come help me for a moment_?

“Already on it.” Hank was already coming through the study doors before Charles called to him. “I thought he might be getting hungry soon.” He lifted Kurt out of Charle’s arms. The expression on the nanny’s face tightened.

Charles turned his concentration on the woman in front of him, carefully erasing all memory of  the baby she had seen. He escorted her to the door so she wouldn’t get lost on the way out, and thanked her kindly for her time.

Perhaps, it would be better to try to manage without a nanny.

For one aching moment, Charles wished he hadn’t sent Moira away. Surely she would have some helpful advice for him. Although, as a geneticist, Charles knew that having a knack for caring for children was not something that automatically came with being female. It might seem that way sometimes, but was actually something most daughters learned from observing their mothers. Moira was a career woman. Maybe, she wouldn’t manage any better than they already had. But at least she wouldn’t shrink away at the sight of Kurt’s unique coloring.

Pushing that thought aside, Charles went in search of his co-parent.

Hank wasn’t in the kitchen, although the mixing-bowl where Hank prepared formula for Kurt was sitting out. Charles checked the nursery next, but there was no Hank there. Curious, he wandered through the hallways. He could have found Hank faster by just using his telepathy, but it wasn’t like he was in a hurry. He didn’t have other duties pressing for his time.

Half an hour later, after searching the house from top to bottom. Charles found Hank and the baby in the last place he expected; Hank’s lab. Upon first glance, he thought the place was empty, but there was definitely a familiar presence in here. Brows furrowed, Charles looked up to see Hank, blue and furry and  hanging upside-down from a support beam in the ceiling. He had an empty bottle in one hand, and the baby in the other.

“What--?”

“Sh!” Hank put a hand to his lips. “He’s asleep again.”

“Interesting choice of nap location.” Charles looked around at the lab, full of sharp objects and things that a child could swallow and choke on. “I thought we agreed this space was going to be off-limits to him?”

“He can’t crawl yet. Besides, he likes it up here.”

“Hm.” The baby was happy and comfortable, his mind oozing warm thoughts. He liked the tickle of Hank’s fur, and thought the Beast’s big arms felt firm and safe. “Well, just--we’re going to have to baby proof this space if you’re going to make this a habit.”

“We’ve got time. He shouldn’t start crawling for another few months.” Instead of lab equipment, Hank’s work desk was covered with baby books. “No luck with the nanny?”

Charles shook his head. “No.”

“That’s twenty in two weeks.”

“Yes.”

There was a reason the baby’s mother hadn’t left him at a normal orphanage. Charles felt a pang of regret for the way he had brushed aside Raven’s desire to be viewed as normal. He had tried to understand, but the fact that she could blend in made it easy to forget. This baby could not blend in, and the world was not ready to accept mutants. Therefore, he could never leave the mansion. Never go to school. Never have a normal life in any way.

“It looks like we’re on our own.”


	3. Walking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kurt learns to walk. So does Charles. The residents of the Xavier household have a choice to make. Accept their mutations, or take the serum that helps them blend.

 

Each step was a struggle. Charles had never imagined that it could take so much effort, or hurt so much, to walk. He hung onto the parallel bars the therapist had brought for him, still not able to take all of his weight on his legs.

Charles had cried when he felt them a week ago after trying the first dose of Hank’s new serum. He had been so engrossed in the feeling, it had taken him a few moments to notice what was missing. There were so few people around, only Hank and Kurt, that the absence hadn’t been very noticeable at first. Only when he saw Hank’s anxious face and realized he could not sense the echo of the feeling behind it, had Charles realized that while the serum reconnected the nerves in his legs, it numbed his telepathy.

Charles staggered another step. Next to him, baby Kurt clapped his hands and clambered to his feet. His legs were getting stronger every day too, although still nearly as wobbly as Charle’s. Kurt grabbed hold of his tiny walker and staggered forward next to Charles, following him as he walked down the length of the supportive bars.

Soon, they would both be walking unassisted. Kurt for the first time in his life, Charles for the second.

It had been a rare moment of panic, when Hank had first injected Charles with the serum. Charles had declared he could feel his legs and rose to his feet, only to collapse on the ground again. Atrophy, the doctor had said. After all, those muscles hadn’t been used for years. They needed to be strengthened before they could be used properly again.

So here he was. Professor Charles Xavier, learning to walk side-by-side with his nephew.

The constant aching pain in his legs almost made up for the numbness in his head.

There was a flash of light, and Charles looked up to see Hank holding a camera as he snapped a picture of man and baby, side-by-side with their walking assistive devices. 

“Hank!” Charles was in his undershirt and sweatpants, not exactly proper attire for a photo.

Hank only grinned. “That’s going to be a good one for the photo album.” Hank hadn’t cared about proper attire since he bought that confounded camera and started snapping off photos at the most random moments of the day. Namely, any time Kurt was doing anything cute.

Kurt raised his pudgy hands, gave a happy squeal, and landed flat on his butt. When the baby fell, it didn’t seem to hurt at all. He certainly didn’t have as far to fall. Charles, on the other hand, was very careful as he sat himself down next to the one-year-old. He didn’t need any more complications to his health than he already had.

“You made it farther today!” Hank exclaimed.

“Yes.” Charles nodded and took a long drink of water, feeling as if he’d run a marathon instead of just walking a few feet. “It’s coming along.” Slower than he would like, but it was coming. He would walk on his own again soon, after which he would never, ever sit in that hated wheelchair again.

“Waaaa!” Kurt suddenly let out a wail.

Hank and Charles both stared at the baby. 

“What do you think he wants?”

Until a few days ago, Charles had always known what Kurt wanted, often before the baby even got around to crying. Now, they had to go through a guess-and-check process.

Hank didn’t say anything about how frustrating that could be. Merely started ticking items off the list. “I fed him half an hour ago, and he shouldn’t need a nap yet.”

“Check his diaper?”

“Your turn.” Hank picked up the baby and handed him to Charles.”I did it last time.”

Charles frowned. “Right.” He took Kurt into his arms, but the child only screamed louder and reached for Hank, nearly tipping himself out of Charles’ grasp. “I think he wants you.”

“Hey there.” Hank carefully gathered Kurt up into his arms again, bouncing the baby gently. “What’s wrong, little guy?”

Kurt slapped his palm against Hank’s skin, then pulled with his tiny fingers. 

Charles and Hank exchanged a look with twin pairs of raised eyebrows.

“What does that mean?” Hank asked on reflex again.

Charles shook his head. “I’m not sure.” Kurt had been exceptionally fussy this past week, as his two dads failed to respond as quickly as usual to his demands. The baby was far too young to understand that Uncle Charles just couldn’t read his mind anymore.

Kurt pulled at his own blue skin, and then at Hank’s pale skin and wailed louder. 

“You know, he always enjoys it when you are blue. He thinks it’s more comfortable when you’re fluffy and furry.”

Hank gave a nervous half-smile. “He wants me to be blue?”

Charles rested his chin in his palm, considering. “Yes. Well. He’s blue, and he’s old enough notice that everyone else is not, even if he can’t even say the word yet.”

Hank lowered his head to look Kurt in the eye. “You want me to be blue like you?”

Kurt reached up to touch Hanks’ face, raising his hand to run it through Hank’s hair. 

“Look, Kurt. I know you’re blue too, but blue isn’t---people don’t like to see us when we’re blue. This is the way I was born, see. I’m not supposed to be blue.” Hank paused, turning from the child to his friend. “You know, we haven’t really talked about what we’re going to do when he gets old enough to go to school. We can’t send him to public school. We can’t even invite other kids over to play with him.”

“We were going to open an entire school, I think we can manage to home school one child.” Charles was pretty sure, even without his telepathy, that wasn’t the answer Hank was looking for. He frowned, studying Hank, trying to figure out what else the man wanted to say. He’d been so accustomed to knowing the thoughts and emotions behind words, it was awkward to navigate a conversation without that.

“Yes, we were going to open a school. But it was more of a high school or a middle school. Can we really teach kindergarten? Do we really want him to be the only student? He’s going to need friends.” Hank paused again. “I’ve had better luck with refining the serum. I think I could use it to make Kurt not be blue anymore.”

“Oh.”

They both stood in silence for a moment while Kurt continued to pull at Hank’s face, looking for fur. 

“Yes, that would solve a lot of our problems, wouldn’t it?” Charles without his telepathy. Hank without his fur, and Kurt no longer blue. They could all pretend to be a normal human family.  “How sure are you that there wouldn’t be unexpected side effects?” Every serum Hank came up with seemed to have its own dose of the unexpected. The fur. The lack of telepathy.

“I can’t be one hundred percent sure until I inject him.” Hank grimaced. “Unfortunately, we don’t have another test subject for this kind of thing.”

“He’s one year old.”

“I know. I know!” Hank’s expression was torn. “Everything I believe about medical ethics says we shouldn’t do it. Not until he’s old enough to make the choice. But by then--he’ll have spent his entire life in hiding. It was hard enough for me to hide just my feet. And Raven--”

Silence fell between them. They both knew that Raven had felt liked a prisoner in her own skin. Charles was only beginning to realize how much. 

“He needs to socialize with other children. All of the books agree.” Hank bounced Kurt on his hip. “Raven could hide. She could go places, meet people. Kurt can’t. Not if we want to keep him safe.”  Despite Charles’ desire for mutants to be accepted by the world, he and Hank had both confirmed the need to stay hidden after nearly being obliterated by both Russian and American missiles on a beach near Cuba.  “And without your powers, if anyone sees Kurt, there’s no one to make them forget.”

Charles looked down at his legs and squeezed his knee, just to make sure he could still feel it. “Yes.” There were quite a lot of things that had become more awkward since Charles lost the use of his mutant gift. Hank had just pointed out one more thing Charles had not thought of, preoccupied by his grueling therapy sessions.

“Well, aren’t we getting a few years ahead of ourselves?” Charles nodded to Kurt. “First he has to learn how to walk, talk, and grow in all of his teeth.”

Hank grimaced again. “I’ll be happy when that’s over.” Kurt was now trying to climb up his shoulder, using his tail wrapped around Hank’s neck to steady himself. Raising his hands, Kurt reached up, up toward the ceiling. Hank grinned, wrapped both hands around Kurt’s waist, and tossed him into the air. “You want up, huh, buddy?”

With a gleeful squeal, Kurt reached out and caught hold of the light fixture. He left Hank’s arms, climbing up the light to the ceiling.

“No! No! Kurt! Come down at once!” Charles pointed to the floor, but that baby did not care. He stretched out on the light fixture, his tail wrapped tight around the metal rod connecting the light to the wall, and laughed again.

“Can’t walk, but he can climb. Dr. Spock didn’t say anything about this.” Hank muttered. He shifted his shoulders, turning his head from side to side as he started the process that would turn him blue again. His voice deepened. “Kurt! You heard Uncle Charles! Not playing on the ceiling!” Hank jumped, flipping as he went, and digging his claws into the ceiling so he could hang within reach of Kurt.

Kurt squealed with glee and jumped straight into Hank’s arms, where he burrowed into the mutant’s furry shoulder.

Hank snorted, but there was a small smile on his face. “You like the fur, huh?”

“Yes, that’s all well and good, but you’re going to tear a hole in my ceiling!” Charles had the sense he was fighting a losing battle on this one. “I told you you should have never gotten him used to being up there.”

o0o

Charles was startled awake by the sound of a baby’s wails. Blearily, he looked at his bedside clock and then a the empty space next to it. No baby monitor meant that tonight was Hank’s night to play nanny. Charles was supposed to be able to sleep.

Another wail echoed down the hallway. Kurt’s screaming volume had increased with his lung capacity. He was getting louder with every passing month. Charles picked up a pillow, ready to press it over his ear to muffle the sound, but waited for a brief moment first. Yes, there was the sound of Hank, making shushing noises. Good. No reason Charles couldn’t go back to sleep.

Except for the tendril of worry that threaded through his thoughts, worry that wasn’t his own. Charles tried to shift his legs, and realized that he could not move them. Everything below his waist was numb. Which was why someone else’s thoughts were intruding on his. Charles didn't panic, he was used to this. The serum often wore off overnight, and there was a full needle by his bed ready for the next morning's injection.

Charles hauled himself to a sitting position with a frown and concentrated on sorting out the thoughts in his mind. There was Hank, pacing. His worry was a bright, sharp flare, increasing with every minute. He’d been up with Kurt for at least the last half-hour. In his arms, Kurt’s wails didn’t do justice to the discomfort in his belly. He was hot, he was sore, and something was _wrong_.

Charles and Hank had both noted how fussy Kurt had been these past few days. There had been a slight fever, but Hank said that was a normal part of teething.

This wasn’t normal. It was always less precise, reading an infant, but Charles was attuned enough to know that something was wrong. Kurt needed medical attention. Now. 

Charles reached over to his bedside table. His wheelchair was nowhere within reach, being tucked out of sight and gathering dust in the closet for the past two months. He had to take his serum if he wanted to get out of this bed. Charles rolled up his pajama sleeve and picked up the needle just as Hank burst in the door.

“There’s something wrong, Charles.” Hank paced in agitation around the room, Kurt, bawling, cradled against his shoulder. “He’s sick or--”

“I know. He needs a doctor. I’ll be ready to be up in a moment.” 

“What are we going to tell the doctor?” Hank asked.  _We need your powers right now._

“Right.” Charles sighed and set the needle with his serum aside. If the doctor reacted the same way the prospective nannies had, they would need a way to do some damage control. A way to make people forget. “Give Kurt to me. You’ll need to fetch my chair.”

Charles stomach felt sick at the word, but there was nothing for it. The squalling child in his arms was more important than whether he walked or rolled to the doctor’s office. Charles hung onto the child while he waited for Hank to return, a dark fear gripping him tight. What if little Kurt was too sick? What if they didn’t get him help in time? Would he make it?

“Do you think the doctor will be able to treat him?” Charles voiced his last fear as Hank came back into the room, chair in tow.

“Most mutants are susceptible to human illnesses, and human treatments are usually effective. Honestly, we’ve been lucky he hasn’t really been sick before this.” Hank’s worry was increasing to the point Charles was having a hard time filtering it out. Everything was so hard to filter out these days, especially the pain. The sadness. 

It was one of the reasons Charles had been happy to trade his telepathy for the use of his legs. But not tonight.

Tonight, his gift would be needed.

o0o

“The infection had probably been incubating for a few days.” The doctor said matter-of-factly as he hooked Kurt up to an IV antibiotic. He didn’t pay any heed to the baby’s blue skin. It took a lot of effort to keep the doctor unaware of that one fact while letting the man think freely about everything else.

But not so much that Charles couldn’t keep track of the conversation around him.

“Why wouldn’t we have noticed? I mean, he’s been a little fussy, but we thought that was just teething.” There were waves of guilt coming off of Hank. As if this was all his fault. But Charles knew the truth. It wasn’t his friend’s fault.

It was his own.

“Well, a child can’t tell us that it’s this tummy that hurts instead of his teeth, now can he?” the doctor said.

Hank glanced at Charles briefly with quiet flash of thought about how things had been more difficult with Kurt since the telepathy went silent. But he said nothing.

“No, he can’t,” Charles said. He watched Kurt slowly calm, his fussing quieting as the drugs took effect, numbing his pain. “How long will he need to stay in the hospital? We would really like to take him home soon.”

Charles felt the answer echo through the doctor’s thoughts before it came out of his mouth. “He should stay overnight to finish the antibiotic, and then at least 24-hours for observation.”

“Is there any way we can monitor him at home?” Hank asked. He knew that Charles was putting a lot of effort into keeping the staff from noticing Kurt’s blueness. He didn’t know how long the telepath could keep it up.

_ As long as I need to _ . Charles determined that he would stay awake and alert at the toddler’s side for as long as Kurt needed to be in the hospital. He could go 24-hours without sleep easily enough.

But all of this could have been avoided if Charles had noticed the signs of infection two days ago. They would have been able to give Kurt a simple antibiotic pill and kept him safely at home.

Charles massaged his numb legs, longing to feel something, even the pain.

It looked like he had a choice to make. But with the pair of trusting yellow eyes looking up at him out of a blue face on the exam table, Charles knew that it was really no choice at all.


End file.
